Olentangy may not need new school

Friday

Dec 7, 2012 at 12:01 AMDec 7, 2012 at 11:32 AM

New enrollment forecasts in the Olentangy school district cast doubt on the need for a new school approved by voters last year. The school board hasn't decided whether it will need to sell $13.5 million in bonds that voters approved last spring for what would be the district's 16th elementary school.

Collin Binkley, The Columbus Dispatch

New enrollment forecasts in the Olentangy school district cast doubt on the need for a new school approved by voters last year.

The school board hasn’t decided whether it will need to sell $13.5 million in bonds that voters approved last spring for what would be the district’s 16th elementary school. But officials say the new enrollment data make it less likely they will ever need the new building.

A firm the district regularly hires to make the forecasts estimates that the schools will have 1,300 fewer students in a decade than the firm projected last year, although the district still expects to add about 3,300 students in that time, or 18 percent of current enrollment.

“There’s still growth, just not the same numbers and percentage increases as before,” board President Dave King said yesterday.

The district has been the state’s fastest-growing for nine years, with more than three times the enrollment now than in 2000. It is now the seventh-largest district in Ohio.

Projections are much lower this year because far fewer young students have enrolled in the district than expected, and the number of pre-kindergarten students hasn’t lived up to forecasts, according to the study by the Dublin firm Dejong Healy.

“There’s been a slight drop in the birth count in the area,” said Tracy Healy, president of the company. Plus, she said, development in the district has stayed relatively flat in the past few years.

Forecasts for elementary and middle schools are level over the next decade, but officials expect high-school enrollment to swell by 2,400 over the next seven years before it levels off.

If projections hold true, district high schools would be over capacity in three years, but officials don’t plan to build a fourth high school for at least a decade, King said.

Officials hope to save space by offering more classes online or before and after school. They’re also looking at a proposal to move all advanced-placement classes to a building outside the district, freeing space in schools.

“The slowdown is going to allow us to look at things differently instead of treading water to keep up with all the students,” board member Julie Wagner Feasel said.

Voters approved the bond for the school last year with 53 percent support, along with a combined operating levy and other bond money for buses, technology and capital improvements.

State law gives districts five years to sell bonds once voters approve them, but district officials said that, because they have sold some of the total $24.4 million bond issue, the state rule no longer applies. That means they could still decide to issue the bonds later.

Officials initially said they would need to build the school in 2014 but later revised that to 2018.

Although the district’s development committee now questions whether Olentangy will ever need the new elementary, district spokeswoman Karen Truett said that, with recent news that an outlet mall is headed to the area, development could defy predictions.

“We’re in a good position to act if we’re needed to act,” Truett said.